Archive for the ‘Buddhism’ Category

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — Buddhist monks, who are bound by faith to nonviolence, are grappling with how to rid a temple of a severe ant infestation without killing the insects.

Stinging red ants have plagued the Hong Hock See Temple in northern Penang state for a year, causing one worshipper to be bitten so badly last month that he had to receive hospital treatment, said Elma Lin, a temple volunteer worker.

A temple disciple tried using a vacuum cleaner to gather up the ants before freeing them in a nearby forest, but the method failed to purge the insects, Lin said.

“We haven’t found a solution so far,” Lin said. “Nothing has worked.”

The temple’s chief monk, Boon Keng, was quoted by The Star newspaper as saying that the monks had to “respect other living things” in the temple.

“When an ant drops on you, you must not flick it away or blow on it,” he told the newspaper. “If you do, it will bite to hold on. You just have to shake it off.”

The newspaper published a photograph of Boon Keng standing beside a sign at the temple that read: “Beware poisonous ants. Do not sit under the tree.”

The decades-old temple has more than 10 monks living there and hundreds of devotees, Lin said.

I now understand the parable told in the Far East which states: first the mountain is a mountain, then the mountain is not a mountain, then it is again.

The parable had always confused me; I could understand the mountain not being a mountain anymore, but why would it then become a mountain again?

There is no sense in explaining how or why I now understand this, except to say that I believe I do.

I realize now that this parable has to be understood on your own and cannot be explained for you, so I can’t help anyone else much, except to state it in a different way which might add a clue:

first the mountain is a mountain, then the mountain is not a mountain, then it is a mountain again, then the mountain is not a mountain again, then it is, then it isn’t once again, but soon is a mountain again, et cetera and et cetera and et cetera . . .